ed out on Eden, and it had been
ravaged before her eyes. She had been thinking of to-morrow, and this
vast prospect of beauty and serenity had been part of the pageant
in which it moved. Not the valley alone had been marauded, but that
"To-morrow," and all it meant to her.

Instantly the valley had become clouded over for her, its glory and its
grace despoiled. She turned back to the room where the white petticoat
lay upon the chair, but stopped with a little cry of alarm.

A man was standing in the centre of the room. He had entered stealthily
by the back door, and had waited for her to turn round. He was haggard
and travel stained, and there was a feverish light in his eyes. His
fingers trembled as they adjusted his belt, which seemed too large for
him. Mechanically he buckled it tighter.

"You're Jenny Long, ain't you?" he asked. "I beg pardon for sneakin' in
like this, but they're after me, some ranchers and a constable--one o'
the Riders of the Plains. I've been tryin' to make this house all day.
You're Jenny Long, ain't you?"

She had plenty of courage, and, after the first instant of shock, she
had herself in hand. She had quickly observed his condition, had marked
the candour of the eye and the decision and character of the face, and
doubt of him found no place in her mind. She had the keen observation
of the dweller in lonely places, where every traveller has the
potentialities of a foe, while the door of hospitality is opened to him
after the custom of the wilds. Year in, year out, since she was a
little girl and came to live here with her Uncle Sanger when her father
died--her mother had gone before she could speak--travellers had halted
at this door, going North or coming South, had had bite and sup, and
bed, may be, and had passed on, most of them never to be seen again.
More than that, too, there had been moments of peril, such as when,
alone, she had faced two wood-thieves with a revolver, as they
were taking her mountain-pony with them, and herself had made them
"hands-up," and had marched them into a prospector's camp five miles
away.

She had no doubt about the man before her. Whatever he had done, it was
nothing dirty or mean--of that she was sure.

"Yes, I'm Jenny Long," she answered. "What have you done? What are they
after you for?"

"Oh! to-morrow," he answered, "to-morrow I got to git to Bindon. It's
life or death. I come from prospecting two hundred miles up North. I
done it in two days